This is part of a series of occasional short essays
from the "Professor's Soap Box." It is not intended to be a detailed
exposition; rather, it is meant to give you food for thought and to
challenge some popular ideas.
Introduction
Have you noticed the rise in psychic "hotlines" and
TV shows nowadays? Five years ago, it would have been difficult to find
even a psychic commercial on TV. Now, there are several half-hour
infomercials, aired almost round the clock.
Have you also noticed New Age music cropping up here
and there, not to mention the infiltration of Eastern Mysticism into
the West, and increased UFO sightings (not to mention TV programs about
them)? How about the rise of "what's in it for me" attitudes, a morality
of convenience, and a market-driven society (i.e., making a living as
an end in itself)? While we're at it, we could add the increasing denial
of absolute truth by most Americans--even though a large proportion
claim to be evangelical Christians, the prioritizing of relevance over
truth, of pragmatics over knowledge, of feelings over beliefs. Al
Franken, of Saturday Night Live fame, some years ago epitomized what we
are seeing with his self-serving commentary (he humorously suggested
that this decade should be labeled the "Al Franken" decade).
A New Kind of Charismatic
Part and parcel of this phenomenon is the rising
popularity of charismatic Christianity--especially among those who had
never been attracted to the charismatic movement before. Specifically,
the Pentecostal/charismatic movement historically has roots in Wesleyan
theology and practice. In other words, it has historically been
associated with Arminian theology. The reason for this is not
immediately obvious, but can be seen through a variety of connections.
Arminianism teaches, among other things, that a person once saved can
lose his salvation. Hence, Arminians put a strong emphasis on moral
duty, as well as spiritual experiences, as the continued confirmation
that one is still saved. It is a natural extension from this stance that
the test by which a person knows he is saved is various manifestations
of the Spirit. Thus the craving for supernatural experiences is both
endemic to the charismatic mindset and necessary as continued
confirmation of salvation.
But this craving for confirmation is not the
motivation of many who have become charismatics in the last few years.
Indeed, what is unusual about the current popularity of the charismatic
movement, principally the Vineyard form, is that has attracted many Calvinists as well as many well-trained scholars. Every year at the Evangelical Theological Society meetings1
I learn of a few more professors of theology who have joined the ranks
of the Vineyard movement. Often, the response of colleagues when they
find out about one these theologians is one of astonishment: "No! Not
him! I never would have expected him to become a charismatic!"
Cognitive Christianity
and the Impoverished Soul
Why are scholars suddenly becoming charismatics?
What has happened in the last few years to attract the intelligentsia to
this group?
We can give both a short answer and a long one. The
short answer is that many Christian scholars have for a long time
embraced a Christianity that is almost exclusively "from the neck up."
That is, theirs is a cognitive faith, one where reason reigns supreme.
They are usually fine exegetes and theologians, able to defend the faith
and articulate their views in a coherent, biblical, profound, and
logical way. But (without naming names) many of these savants have lost
their love for Christ. They love the Bible and know it inside and out.
But their soul has become impoverished. They love God with their mind
only; that is the extent of their spiritual obligation as they see it.
In fact, for them, personal experience--especially of a charismatic
sort--is anathema. It has no place in the Christian life. Study of the
Bible so that they can control the text is what the Christian life is all about.
But when crisis comes--such as the death of a loved
one, a teenage daughter's pregnancy, or some major upheaval in their
church ministries--their answers appear shallow and contrived, both to
others and themselves. They have the inability to hurt with the hurting,
though they know all the right verses on suffering! They begin to
search for answers themselves, answers of an entirely different sort.
Often, in the crucible of the crisis, they attend a charismatic meeting.
And there, a "prophet" reveals something about their life. They are
both amazed at the prophecy and deeply touched at the perception into
their own condition. (Of course, cognitive types almost always marvel
when other, more sensitive people, intuitively recognize traits and
characteristics, internal workings and struggles in others.) Their souls
get drenched with an emotional infusion that had been quenched for too
long. It doesn't take long before they hold hands with those whom they
used to oppose, even to the point of now leading charismatic groups.
They in fact become the theologians of a new breed of charismatic,
giving a rather sophisticated rationale for charismata. In the process,
they have gone through a paradigm shift: their final authority is no
longer reasoning about the Scriptures; now it is personal experience.
Because of a crisis, personal, spiritual experience
has replaced reason as the authority that guides their lives. They have
exchanged, in some measure, their heart for their mind.2 That's the short answer.
The Age of Epistemological Narcissism
The long answer is this. The history of the Church
and indeed of western civilization, in terms of authority, can be traced
out rather simply.3 Before the Reformation, tradition
was the final authority. This included the tradition of the Roman
Catholic Church and all its trappings. When that pesky little German
monk, Martin Luther, nailed his ninety-five theses to the door of the
Wittenberg church, a new authority was boldly announced: revelation.
Actually, it was an old authority, but one which Luther and later
Calvin, Zwingli, Melanchthon, and a host of others, argued had been
subverted to tradition by the Church in Rome. The Reformation's battle
cry was sola scriptura--that is, Scripture alone is our
authority. The Roman Church argued that we needed tradition, especially
the interpretations offered by church fathers, in order to understand
Scripture. This was so, they argued, because the Bible could not be
easily grasped. The Reformers argued for the perspicuity of
Scripture--that it was sufficiently clear to be a good guide in
essential matters, such as the person of Christ, the Trinity, salvation.
In order to prove the point they needed to exercise reason. New
hermeneutical methods were developed, translations were made,
commentaries were written. All of this was consistent with the view that
the Bible should be clearly understood. The Reformers knew it to be so
in their study; they wanted to make it so for the person in the pew.
As long as reason was the handmaid of revelation,
there was no problem. But once reason became master, revelation was
increasingly viewed as unnecessary and, in fact, untrue. With the birth
of the Enlightenment came the promise of a new king. He would soon reign
over virtually all human thought in the western world.
By the end of the nineteenth century, the
Enlightenment had so captured the evangelical community that the Bible
became more an object of study than a guide to life. Seminaries in this
century followed largely the Princeton model (a strongly Calvinist
school) of reasoning about the Scriptures. Pastors were trained to
expound the text of Scripture--and this came to mean explain the text, but not apply
the text. Too many seminaries viewed one's exegetical and theological
skills as the lone spiritual barometer. There was no accountability of
one's life. Whether one believed the Bible and consequently tried to
shape his life by its precepts was often not in view.
The problem with this model was that non-evangelical
scholars could also do first-rate exegesis. Many of these
non-evangelical savants would be considered nonbelievers: besides
rejecting the Bible as the Word of God, they did not embrace the bodily
resurrection of Christ or, sometimes, even the existence of God. Hence,
if quality exegesis was an indicator of spirituality, then an atheist
might be considered spiritual! The barometer of mere knowledge obviously
has its defects, for without belief there is no life. Cognition is
important for true biblical scholarship; but without conversion as a first step, such is certainly not evangelical biblical
scholarship. Further, this approach trickled down to the pew: for many
churches, even today, mere Bible knowledge, regardless of its
application to one's life, is equated with true spirituality. Reason has
come to reign over revelation even for evangelicals.
With the advent of postmodernism, reason has
increasingly become pass. It's not necessarily that reason is rejected
as untrue; rather, it is judged to be irrelevant. So what authority is
left? What authority remains after tradition, revelation, and reason
have all been abandoned? Personal experience. Ours is the age of
epistemological narcissism. This is no longer the age of cogito ergo sum ("I think; therefore, I am"—the hallmark of Cartesian logic); it has become the age of sentio ergo sum
("I feel; therefore, I am"). And since there are no external standards
by which to judge personal experience (since other authorities are
rejected), anything goes--whether it be sensuality or hallucinogenic
existence, full-blown mysticism or an uncritical embracing of
supernatural phenomena from any and all corners.
So, how does the current charismatic movement fit
into this? Why are so many intellectuals embracing the charismata? It
seems that the vacuum left in their souls by a rationalistic faith has
made them ripe for a different kind of authority. As sons of the
Enlightenment, these cognitive scholars have embraced reason as the
supreme authority in their lives. But the rationalism of the
Enlightenment is, when unbridled, antithetical to revelation. These
scholars viewed personal experience as the enemy of the gospel, while
embracing reason as its friend. But when some crisis invades their
lives, and their purely cognitive faith cannot supply the deepest
answers (for it does not address the whole man), they have to find the
answers some place. And they look to an entirely different authority.
They are ripe for excess in one area, just as they had lived in excess
in another. Ironically, they end up mirroring the present age of
postmodernism, just as they had mirrored the past one of rationalism.
In reality, both personal experience and
reason are part of proper human existence. Like fire, they can be used
for good or evil. When they take on the role of supreme authority,
consciously or not, they destroy.4
"I know" and "I feel" must bow to "I believe." (When either one is
elevated above revelation it produces arrogance.) The cognitive content
of that belief is the revealed Word of God. It requires diligent study
to grasp its meaning as fully as mere humans can grasp it. But it will
not be believed unless there is a personal experience with the Risen
One. Thus, the trilogy of authority can be seen this way: both personal
experience and reason are vital means to accessing revelation. We are to
embrace Christ, as revealed in the Word, with mind and heart.5
When either reason or experience attempts to escape the supreme
sovereignty of the revealed Christ, the individual believer starts down a
path of imbalance. Tragically, his service to the Lord Christ is
thereby increasingly curtailed.6
1 The Evangelical Theological
Society is a group of evangelical leaders, principally professors at
seminaries and evangelical colleges. Full membership requires
subscription to a minimal core of doctrines and a Th.M. (Master of
Theology) degree or its equivalent.
2 This does not mean that
these scholars no longer use their brains! But it does mean, for many of
them, that reason is subordinated to personal experience in an
epistemological hierarchy.
3 I owe the framework of the
"long answer" to Dr. Bob Pyne, professor of Systematic Theology at
Dallas Seminary. He is not to be blamed for the details, however!
4 Most charismatics today
would argue that their personal experiences are fully subordinate to
revelation. But most cognitive Christians would also argue that reason
for them is subordinate to revelation.
5 Thus far I have left
tradition out of the equation. This is, however, something of an
overstatement. In reality, most of us employ tradition as a conduit to
another authority. Often we are unaware of the tradition's influence.
Those in Bible churches worship in a way quite different from those in
more liturgical settings; Koreans worship in a way that is markedly
different from African-Americans. And a given group may tacitly assume
that somehow its worship style is the right one, or that others are
wrong because they are different. The difference between evangelical
Protestants and Roman Catholics with reference to tradition is that
evangelical Protestants generally feel more at liberty (and more
responsible) to question their tradition, and to change it in line with
what they perceive is the biblical norm. In other words, they are able,
when it is brought to the conscious level, to subordinate tradition to
revelation.
6 You will notice that I
have not in this paper given any arguments against the charismatic
movement. This paper is instead intended to set the stage, giving a
rationale for why so many are flocking toward this kind of Christianity.
In later papers we will address specific charismatic arguments. Suffice
it say here that our thesis should be clear: What is endemic to the
modern charismatic movement is an elevation of personal experience above
revelation as final authority.
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